National Immigration Forum Funded by Soros and the Left

The National Immigration Forum (NIF), the force behind the so-called “Evangelical Immigration Table” (EIT), is actually a front group for players on the institutional left including billionaire George Soros and the Ford Foundation, according to reporting by Breitbart News and other outlets.

According to the Huffington Post, EIT is running a $250,000 advertising campaign in favor of the Senate’s “Gang of Eight” immigration bill. Even so, EIT admitted to Breitbart News it does not legally exist as an incorporated political entity or non-profit organization but said NIF is the group that “facilitates” its activities.

NIF is a power player in immigration politics, and includes among its leadership some of the most powerful Washington figures on the issue.

In 2009, OSI donated $257,152 to NIF aimed at “implementing immigration reform campaign through communications, policy, and field organizing.”

Also in 2009, OSI donated another $1.5 million to “allow” NIF to “manage and lead Four Pillars Campaign for comprehensive immigration reform, and sustain core policy work supporting and leading policy efforts.”

A year later, in 2010, Soros’s OSI gave NIF another $1.5 million over two separate grants both intended for “general operating support.”

NIF has also received $1 million total from the leftist Ford Foundation, spread over two separate half-million-dollar grants in 2009 and 2011. Those grants were both intended for advocacy in favor of comprehensive immigration reform.

Jim Wallis, the president and CEO of Sojourners, a leading force in the Evangelical Immigration Table group, has admitted to accepting funding from Soros as well.

World magazine writer Marvin Olasky laid out in a 2010 article how Wallis and his organization, Sojourners, had received $325,000 from Soros groups over three grants from 2004, 2006 and 2007. According to OSI’s 2007 990 form filed with the IRS, available publicly through the Foundation Center, the 2007 money–a total of $100,000–was for Wallis’s Sojourners “to support the Christians for Comprehensive Immigration Reform Campaign.”

Wallis originally denied being funded by Soros when he was first confronted with the accusation, and accused Olasky of lying. “It’s not hyperbole or overstatement to say that Glenn Beck lies for a living. I’m sad to see Marvin Olasky doing the same thing,” Wallis said in 2010 interview with Patheos. “No, we don’t receive money from Soros. Given the financial crisis of nonprofits, maybe Marvin should call Soros and ask him to send us money.”

“So, no, we don’t receive money from George Soros,” Wallis added. “Our books are totally open, always have been. Our money comes from Christians who support us and who read Sojourners. That’s where it comes from. In fact, we’ve had funding blocked, this year and last, by liberal foundations who didn’t like our stance on abortion. Other liberal groups were happy to point out to them that our stance wasn’t kosher on abortion, so our funding was blocked.”

After Olasky and the National Review‘s Jay Richards confronted this claim by Wallis, Wallis admitted he made an incorrect statement to Patheos and that he was accepting Soros money. “I should have declined to comment until I was able to review the blog post in question and consulted with our staff on the details of our funding over the past several years,” Wallis said in a statement.

“Instead, I answered in the spirit of the accusation and did not recall the details of our funding over the decade in question. The spirit of the accusation was that Sojourners is beholden to funders on the political left, which is false. The allegation concerned three grants received over 10 years from the Open Society Institute that made up the tiniest fraction of Sojourners’ funding during that decade–so small that I hadn’t remembered them.”

While that original Soros funding may have been almost a decade old when it was uncovered, Wallis has subsequently accepted more money from the leftist billionaire. In a 2011 story, Olasky noted that Wallis had confirmed to him he accepted another $150,000 from Soros for a grant that would take hold in 2012.

Interestingly enough, even though evangelicals are receiving funding from Soros and his groups, his official website notes that he “identifies himself as an atheist.”

Soros is also well known for his pro-amnesty, open borders positions on immigration.